


Power Up

by cat_77



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Kamikaze tendencies, Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-01
Updated: 2013-05-01
Packaged: 2017-12-10 01:36:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/780263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cat_77/pseuds/cat_77
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was like an old video game with crappy animation.  Too bad that little power strip above his head seemed to be near empty.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Power Up

Clint took the blow, rolled with it, dodged the next. The third and fourth ones made contact, but the fifth skidded across him and he was fairly sure there was at least the gift of knuckles scraping against hard concrete as a reward. The thug raised his hand, blood glistening across his fist, and tried again.

They had taken his bow, ripped it from his grasp and tossed it to the side. Considering “the side” was the edge of a building eighteen floors up, he had little hope of reaching it now. He still had his quiver though, for whatever good that did him. He felt it as he rolled, the unmalleable structure of it digging against his spine, carving marks deep into his posterior ribs. He reached for it now, grabbed a single arrow, shaft slick in his blood and sweat soaked hands, and jabbed it as far and deep into his opponent as he could.

It wasn’t enough. He knew it wouldn’t be before he made the attempt, but he at least had to make that attempt, had to try. Whatever had been done to these guys made them damn near unsusceptible to harm of any kind, skin thick as lead, but if the three idiots wasted their time with him, it was three less that his teammates had to deal with on the streets below.

Another fist collided and he felt like he had been hit with a bag of bricks. Really, really heavy bricks. He spit out blood, knew not to try to even talk at this point as he’d just choke on it and, besides, his comm had been lost in the first minute or so of this whole debacle so there really was no point anyway. He tucked, rolled, and came upside an exposed vent shaft. There was a screen across it, designed to keep birds and other vermin out, and there was no way he had enough time to mess with the screws that held it in place, no way to get through and slide down a floor or so to possible safety.

He did, however, have time to use it as a cover and pry loose the hidden compartment at the bottom of his quiver with one hand, the package within falling light and deadly into his palm. The men rounded the corner and pretty much instantly grabbed at him, reinforcing his belief that they didn’t want him dead, they just wanted him period, and they didn’t really care what state he was in when they got him.

As curious as he was about their plans, he really rather did not want to become the latest test subject for whoever thought they were running the show. Instead, he played not quite dead, but definitely beaten, something that was far too easy to do in his current condition. He let them surround him, one in front, one at either side, the sealed vent at his back. 

Two held his arms, not bothering to check what he may or may not hold in his hands, and the third dug out something that looked eerily like a hypodermic. He flipped the switch on the device and it vibrated once silently in his hand, a sign that the initiation sequence had begun. He now had thirty seconds to key the next sequence or it defaulted to giving him exactly another thirty seconds until it blew, the payload strong enough to take the bastards surrounding him with him, if he was really lucky. If he wasn’t quite that lucky, it should at least damage them a bit and probably take him out of the equation. Not the world’s best solution, but at least he would both go down fighting and go down in a way that wouldn’t leave him as someone’s pawn in a game he flat out refused to play.

The main goon was talking, something about whatever he held being only the first step and yadda and Clint wasn’t really listening beyond realizing he had at least another minute to panic as apparently it was only the equivalent of a sedative and not the real deal. He pushed the button to give himself more time and watched the man’s blocky, grayish lips move, comparing them to that of a really crappy video game character and mentally picturing the little life/energy bars glowing above each person’s head. His own was way too fucking low, but there wasn’t much he could do about that right now other than wait and plan and compare the bars again after he blew the shit out of everyone.

He realized he may, possibly, have been a bit punch drunk. If he took them out, he took himself out and the little bars would all fade to black and, really, he should have known that right off instead of having to think about it for quite so long. He also didn’t know why he was comparing everything to a video game except maybe it had something to do with the marathon session with Thor and Bruce over the past few days but, really, the graphics on those were far better than the weird looking thing in front of him now.

The goon was apparently done with his little monologue and now moved forward with the syringe and, yeah, so not going to happen. He hit the next button on the device and imagined the little sing-song “powering up” tune from the game they played and readied himself for the worst of it, sparing a thought that, really, ground zero on a Stark Industries blast device should seriously be the least painful distance, even as he also spared a thought for breaking free of the hold, chucking the thing, and diving as far away as humanly possible.

He had slightly miscalculated though – ten seconds, maybe more – because the needle hit his skin and the device shook to note its final thirty second run had begun. On the up side, goons two and three loosened their hold after the plunger went down. On the down side, his coordination was well and truly shot and he barely managed to wrangle himself free, collapsing more to his knees than actually escaping.

There was an odd whir of a noise and the video game analogy reared its head again and, in his less than coherent state, Clint glanced down at the little red line that indicated he had about twenty seconds remaining, revealing what he held. The goons paused, had appropriate panicked reactions, and flinched as if to move to run away. Clint, for his part, simply shrugged, held up the little silver thing, and asked, “Hey, did you want this?”

He tossed it upwards and one of the idiots moved as if to grab it and there was a voice, oddly familiar yet not, that accompanied the whir and said, “Oh, for fuck’s sake, Barton.”

He was knocked fully to the ground, surrounded to the point of near encasement in shiny red metal, and then that metal and the building beneath him rocked with an explosion, the heat licking at his skin even as the cement cracked beneath him. When his ears stopped ringing and the brightness passed to the point he thought he could open his eyes again, he looked up into the golden mask, his own bloody face reflecting back at him. Regardless of the possible identity issues, he said, “Hey, Tony.” His words were slurred and slowed and the world was spinning around him even though he was fairly certain that several hundred pounds of metal suit were holding him in place. “They drugged me,” he managed, needing at least that to be known.

“And beat the shit out of you too,” Tony’s voice replied through the speakers on the suit. He didn’t raise the mask but, then again, he was close enough that to do so would likely hit Clint in the nose with the visor. Instead, he asked, “Where the hell is your comm?”

Clint waved, or tried to but his hand didn’t work quite right. It also left pretty trails behind and he tried not to focus on those and instead focused on answering the question posed to him. “They knocked that out right away. They wanted me all to their lonesome. I think they liked me.”

“Near mutant shooting and fighting abilities to be added to their repertoire and made into another near invincible soldier? Now why would they want that?” Tony asked with a sigh.

Clint was fairly certain Stark was just being sarcastic, but he was also fairly certain he would not remain conscious for long and he wanted to get in something resembling his usual snarky response, so he replied, “Maybe it’s my dashing good looks?”

He got the expected chuckle and Tony pushed himself up and off of him, even going so far as to offer a gauntleted hand to help him up. “Yeah, no, that’s not going to happen right now,” Clint told him, and then promptly passed out.

He must have either partially woke up, or the drug only put him in a Ketamine-like haze and it was his injuries that had pushed him over the edge, because he had drifting memories of being hauled up and carried in a truly embarrassing way, a jolt of a landing shuddering through his very bones, and the gentleness of hands truly and utterly not covered in armor plating lowering him to a waiting gurney. He blinked and Steve was there, blinked again and his team leader was replaced by his usual partner in crime, and he saw Natasha leaning over him, face all taut with concern.

“They took my bow,” he complained. Medics swarmed around him, but she stayed still, stayed constant through the chaos.

“That’s how we found you,” she replied, and he could picture it, picture his bow falling from eighteen floors up, crashing to the ground and shattering beside his teammates. When no body followed, he hoped they realized he was still alive, and that this is what led Stark to get up there barely in the nick of time.

“Well, that, and that little kamikaze device of yours has a tracker built in that’s activated when the explosives are,” Tony chimed in from somewhere outside of his line of sight. There was a brief weight against the gurney, the smell of dust and embers. “I’ll build you a new bow, even better than the last,” Tony promised, and that was good, that was right, and that was surprisingly awesome.

Clint’s pause was as much due to his limbs being adjusted and multiple lines being poked through his skin as to his current mental state, but he managed to eventually ask, “Will the bow have a tracker in it too?”

“Probably,” Stark admitted, and he swore he could hear the grin to his words.

“Cool,” Clint sighed, letting the drugs and the exhaustion pull him under. The baddies were beaten or else no one would be bothering with the medics yet, and the team was whole or else there would be far more cursing and far more of him fighting to go join in the avenging of the others, and he himself had managed to both take out the goons sent to take him and managed to survive the process at the same time. All in all, he had worse days.

The voices around him muttered and mingled and slowly faded away and, when he awoke, there would be bad food and bad movies and no one would mention the fact that Stark had managed to save the little reinforced case of syringes and at least two of the vials were unaccounted for despite Clint’s insistence to the medics that they only shot him once. And if he itched at that little red mark on his neck and managed to pass his next fitness test with flying colors and maybe accidentally broke a punching bag or three in their private gym, well, no one mentioned that either.

 

End.


End file.
